Breaking Point
by Novoux
Summary: A careful relationship painfully awkward in its first stages becoming more of a dragging routine the further apart they were. L-word turning back to angry hatred that stirred up more fights in the past month they've ever had in a month before they were together. Shizaya.


The sound of the door slamming off of its hinges and cracking the wall alerted him to the fact something was wrong. Again. And this time instead of rolling his eyes or calling out some sort of insult to rile him up, Izaya waited. Kept his back turned while he clicked through emails on his computer, not really reading them. His mind was elsewhere, as it had been for the past week. At this rate, he'd never get any work done.

"Something wrong, Shizu-chan?" Izaya called not nearly as teasingly as he would have six months ago. Just when things were tender and careful and still not quite in a relationship but not quite enemies. He could barely remember then compared to now.

"Nothing." Shizuo growled as he walked by, grabbing a milk bottle from the fridge and slamming the door shut. Izaya winced at the crashing noise and cursed Shizuo's brute strength combined with his nasty temper. "What do you want now, flea?"

Not a term of endearment that came from Shizuo. Izaya grated his teeth together and tried to ignore the pounding headache coming to rest above the bridge of his nose and leak into his eyes, drying them and making every blink sting. "It's obvious something's bothering you, Shizu-chan." Izaya couldn't help his habits. He was never good with these kinds of things. "You usually don't slam the door or break the wall when you're not angry."

Shizuo huffed, roughly sitting in a chair at the dinner table. They were in Shizuo's apartment, Izaya on his personal laptop and Shizuo just back from work. Or wherever he was at ten in the evening. It wasn't exactly what Izaya wanted to think about, but his thoughts pestered him constantly in over-analyzing. Though this wasn't the first time they've had this conversation. There was nothing about this they weren't familiar with.

"Why do you care?" Shizuo called and took a swig of the milk, nearly slamming it back on the table and shattering the glass. Izaya didn't look over from his computer, preferring to not face him now to try and pretend this wasn't happening. It wasn't working very well. "All you care about is your work, flea. You don't even try to talk to me, like you are now."

Izaya's shoulders tensed at the grinding remark. "If you haven't noticed, Shizu-chan, I haven't been able to get anything done this past week. And I am talking to you, so you really need to articulate what point you're trying to make." Fingers tapped against the keyboard in the empty silence hanging between them, denser than the oxygen that was slowly slipping away from them and forcing their breaths to draw in bitter poison and exhale puffs of icy cold. How had things become like this, he wasn't sure either of them knew.

"I don't need your sarcasm, flea. Keep it to your work." Another swig and Izaya could feel the anger rising. He could read Shizuo like a book when the protozoan let him, but only the cover page which frustrated him to no end. "Why am I even talking to you anyway? It's not like you're going to care. Why waste my time, eh, flea?" Simple, jaded barbs to make Izaya angry as if he wasn't even trying. This was what their fights seemed to be about. Shizuo was always angry at something, and Izaya angry because he didn't understand why.

He didn't move his chair around. Just clicking on his keyboard to further annoy Shizuo for some grim desire of his in return for the harsh words Shizuo favored. "I don't know why, either. You wanted this relationship, and so now look where we are now. You think I wanted this?" he snarled, "Oh, wait, you don't even care at all except for your own primitive_ emotions,_" he spat the word like venom and knew how it made Shizuo's eyes darken even though he can't see him. "Shizu-chan, the question is why do you bother, ne? What's the point if you're going to insult me every time you come through the door, or just ignore me the rest of the time you're here? Is there even a point to trying to understand your childishness?"

Shizuo abruptly stood, slamming the glass of milk into the table which crashed loudly in Izaya's ears, still ringing when the chair was roughly spun one hundred-eighty degrees and he came face to face with Shizuo's angry brown eyes. His face was flushed red like a wildfire of angry emotions and the lid of Izaya's laptop slamming into the keyboard with a disturbing cracking sound that made Izaya's eyes narrow. "The _fuck _is your problem!? What's with you, flea? Did you want this relationship, or was this just another game of yours? We've been together for six months, and you don't even act like we're together. You're still an asshole and you don't even talk to me. It's not easy reading your blank expressions, you know." Shizuo's hand gripped the hood of Izaya's coat after reaching back and fisting the material in his strength. Izaya didn't flinch. He knew this routine after so many replays.

"Tsk, Shizu-chan." Izaya commented hollowly. There were emotions buried underneath so many layers he didn't want Shizuo to see because he couldn't stand weakness. So he tries to interpret the situation and hold himself back, as per usual. "It's always the same fight with you. It's not my fault you can't understand anything beyond your limited understanding of how people are. I'm surprised you can even register there's a problem." his words were far more icy than he intended and he knew that they only served to make Shizuo's expression tighten and lower his face closer to his. Hot breaths mingle with each other's and for once, it wasn't a good thing. It feels all wrong now, Izaya realized this and at times when they go to sleep in separate beds in separate apartments he wonders if Shizuo believed this too. He could only scoff at the thought. Like Shizuo could, or would even bother.

"You're a fucking parasite, flea. Absolutely worthless. What did I see in you? Why do this anymore, then? All you do is feed off others for your own gain just because they're your puppets. Is that what you've been doing to me? Tell me if I'm wrong, because if not, I think I have a clear idea of where this is heading." Shizuo snarled back and yanked Izaya out of the chair and slammed him against the wall where Izaya can feel his bones cry out in creaking pain.

Their eyes remain locked in a heated stare. Glittering red against sharpened brown without the hint of any kind feelings for each other. Six months ago, this would have been where they would've started kissing heavily, and lead things to the bedroom where they never went farther than their breath-stealing game of tonsil hockey. He should have known time would run out with how they were. It was a major miscalculation on his part, he noted darkly.

"My, I didn't think Shizu-chan could be so cruel." Izaya breathed quietly and the smallest part of him hoped—wanted—_needed _Shizuo to understand what he couldn't say. He wasn't one for articulating his emotions at all, which usually led them to fighting like this and broken bones (and hearts) to keep them awake at night. But at the same time he didn't want to give himself to someone else, the entire concept was too much to comprehend as to why and how he could trust so easily. "I never would have thought that Shizu-chan would call me a parasite, when you're a beast yourself as if you never considered the thought to cross your mind. And to assume I'm using you? That's low, Shizu-chan." This was the closest they'd been in a long time, and to think Izaya's body betrayed him by actually craving Shizuo's touch made his head spin with the emotions he forced back and grow angry with how stupid he was being. They should've never started this in the first place; this dangerous game of hide-and-seek more than dating and involving the l-word. Should have seen this coming.

Shizuo pulled his face away and Izaya's reddened cheeks cooled considerably. The tight anger remained engraved in his features like it was meant to be there in the first place. Maybe they weren't meant to be, after all. "How the hell would I know what you're doing or thinking, I-za-ya? You never even speak to me unless if you want something. How should I know if you're not using me? Are you that stupid, or is this how you really are?" Questions, questions. Each made Izaya angrier and while he tried to keep himself composed, he realized at times how contagious Shizuo's rage could be. All the accusations and insults could easily tear at him, much more than he cared to admit to himself. Driving the wedge between them and splitting them apart faster than time itself. Only a matter of seconds, now.

"How would you know?" Izaya hissed, shoving Shizuo off of him with a surprise shove to his chest and managing to push him back enough to create at least a foot of space between them. Not like it would change anything. "You make your own assumptions and act as you please, just like a selfish, spoiled _monster._" He watched Shizuo's lips curl into a snarl and dodged the punch that came swinging to his right cheek with a furious growl.

Great—now he's done it. Blew it, any chance of trying to fix whatever was going on. Izaya wasn't even sure how or what had happened, but soon enough they were at each other's throats as if the last six months meant nothing to Shizuo. Perhaps that was how it was in reality. And that one stupid part of Izaya had deluded him through every kiss and every touch to try and ignore it really meant nothing. Where did he go wrong in his thought processes? What was he thinking the day they kissed and touched after chasing each other like before? Apparently he wasn't, and it made him even more frustrated that he could have been affected so easily by how Shizuo behaved. He hated this. It needed to end.

"I_ knew_ it." Shizuo withdrew his cracked knuckles from the crater in the wall. Blood dribbled down the broken skin—bright red like a warning sign, saying _back off, stay away—_if only Izaya had listened like he usually did. A lapse in logic that cost him everything and more. Ugh. "You're just a selfish bastard who doesn't give a shit about who you hurt with your fucking games. And I bet this has all been a game to you, no? Because you haven't given a shit since day one—were you bored? Needing someone, something to experiment your freakish desires on?" Stinging words sunk like poison and spread through Izaya's veins, making his heart pound noisily in his ears while his pulse throbbed in his wrists to his thumbs. He blinked, slowly. His eyes still watching Shizuo although he wanted more to turn away and forget this ever happened.

"You know_ nothing_, Shizu-chan." he spat and curled his lips into a haughty smirk. It was only a mask, Shizuo. Don't—"How could I ever know if you weren't just satisfying your carnal pleasure? Seeing as you are a beast, it's more believable than whatever you want to call the last six months." This has become a game of who can cut the other down first before they break down. The end weighed on both of them with a heavy, thick presence of the each other's blood, burning their eyes and flesh the further they drifted apart.

"Like hell." Shizuo snapped. "You never cared. You just pretended to piss me off all this time, like you always did. I should have never trusted you." Those words hurt like a double-edged sword. Izaya didn't blink as much as the urge forced him to. "You know what, flea? You're just a parasite that uses people for your own twisted games. How do you think it feels, hmm? Do you even _comprehend_ the meaning of what I _felt_ for you?" Angry bitter shards pierced them. They're drifting. Izaya tightened his hands into fists. One hand fished for his switchblade and the other suddenly swung back to deliver a punch to Shizuo's face, blocked by a much stronger hand that grasped the hit to the point of nearly breaking every bone in his hand. Some of his fingers crack in a way that made his lips twist to hide the pain.

"You know nothing." Shizuo knew just what to say to make Izaya's temper become violent in a heartbeat thumping against his ribs. "You're a liar, a fake. I wasted everything on the likes of you." So much rose to the surface Izaya has to swallow them back down to keep from exploding like Shizuo can in a fit of fury. All the words, harsh criticisms, they make him want to pin Shizuo against the wall and make him realize exactly what the protozoan's doing to him just to make it stop because he was sick of this. Enough to vomit until he saw bright red—_danger, danger._

"Well then, I should say the same to you." Izaya remarked coldly. "You're not a saint yourself, Shizu-chan. Accusing me of so many things without even providing evidence, but blind accusations really are your specialty. How should I know that you weren't lying to me?" Shizuo's eyes flashed and another punch flew at him—far too quick for Izaya to sidestep and his fist connected solidly with the flesh of Izaya's eye.

The informant went down with the heavy force knocking him off his feet and sending him stumbling, tripping over his unstable footing and he slammed into the wall with his head cracking before he slid to the floor, unable to stand while the world spun. For a moment he felt rage cloud his vision and blind him save for crimson red while bursts of light snapped over his eyes. Dizziness kept him grounded while Shizuo stalked over with heavy footsteps and stopped right between Izaya's parted legs, kneeling down.

Face to face, Shizuo moved until their lips were nearly brushing. "I can't believe you, fucking flea. After all this time." he sounds hurt under all that anger, and actually let Izaya hear how the pain reflected in his voice—he truly was heartbroken, and the anger covered up the cracks to pretend that it never bothered him. Izaya cursed himself in the art of not knowing what to say—ever. Half-lidded eyes and panting softly he can only stare, trying to focus on Shizuo's blurred image while his brain stumbled over itself in every coherent sentence it tried to form. More than once something came to mind but the moment he meant to say it in the seconds that ticked by the words died on his tongue and he swallowed them bitterly.

Shizuo didn't seem to notice, or care. Whichever suited him, Izaya assumed. "What? Can't say anything now? You're pathetic." he drew away from Izaya, removing his blue sunglasses to stare him in the eyes with that gleam of anger illuminating his outermost thoughts. Izaya could see it in his dazed vision and his brain fell silent—in the worst of all times, really. He prepared himself for this moment weeks ago with the first fight that started. But for some reason all of his efforts sail out the proverbial window and he was left with nothing but the feeling of being split open. His head pounded aggressively when Shizuo's fingers tightened in his hair painfully.

The words that came next were what he prepared himself for. Every day, every fight he prepared himself to hear them so it wouldn't evoke any emotional response from him. He knew it would happen, knowing Shizuo well enough, or so he believed. Still, the preparation was all for naught when Shizuo spoke.

"I _hate _you." Izaya froze. Shizuo was deadly calm, though seething on the inside. His grasp in Izaya's hair brought blood to his scalp from the rough tug of the enunciated word of _hate _and Izaya blinked the sudden reflex of moisture in his eyes away. However it wasn't only the painful pull of his hair that had his head reeling.

Words repeated over and over. _I hate you I hate you I hate you_. Izaya tasted the metallic tang of blood when a fist connected again with his mouth and clicked his jaw together followed by the undeniable ugly, acrid cotton-texture of foreign self-hatred clogging his throat and cloaking his tongue. For moments he sat as his mouth bled profusely after biting his tongue painfully from the force of the blow. Distantly he felt the sting of broken skin and the throb of bruising flesh and possible a cracked jawbone. Despite that, the only thing remotely close to what he could feel (never emotions, that's what got him into this mess in the first place) was the slow, tingling fingers of numbness dripping through his veins like sluggishly forming stalactites that split his veins and bled him out. Every last word in his thoughts to the repressed emotions he didn't understand just yet came oozing out, dribbling in the open wounds while he laid there in a hopelessly pathetic state. Nothing. He could feel nothing.

Raw numbness coursed through him with the hyperactive and unstable beat of his heart striving to keep him alive. His surroundings collapsed and caved in and he could only see the blur in front of him, focusing solely on the pulse that determined he was indeed alive. Surprising, considering that Shizuo hadn't killed him by now.

"...Say something!" Shizuo's angry voice came in distantly. Izaya vaguely recalled it several long moments afterward but his brain refused to put the words together, and instantly he realized that he, the great and godly Orihara Izaya, was shutting down like a broken computer. How embarrassingly shameful. At least his beloved humans couldn't see him like this, right? "...—what the—wrong with you!?"

Hands on his neck. Not too tight, but tight enough to where it was harder to breathe. "I can't—believe you." Izaya tried to blink and did once, twice, and surely enough his vision cleared enough to see Shizuo's angry—heartbroken face. He must have done everything wrong, no matter how much he _tried. _Why did Shizuo not understand what he'd been trying to say? It should have been so easy, even with all the hints, the changes in voice, but nothing. He'd noticed nothing (that shouldn't be enough to make his heart sink) at all. For once, Shizuo might actually be right about this situation entirely. "—ing answer—!"

No. This wasn't right from the start. A lapse in judgment; that's all it took. One single moment of doubt in his self-assurance and then from there began one of the greatest descents Izaya Orihara has ever known. And foolishly he involved himself because at the time he reasoned that work wasn't involved. It was what he so selfishly wanted, though he'd never say. He knew the risks then, calculating the brute force of Shizuo's strength that would more than likely kill him if he got too close (warning signs everywhere, every stop along the way) and for some stupid reason he didn't listen. What was he thinking. The answer? He wasn't.

The first moment their lips brushed together. Static shocks down his throat and echoing in his spine that were cringe-worthy at their finest and downright painful when fingers tightened on his neck and hip. His own fingers curled into bleach-blond hot skin alighting him each moment they were together. An angry kiss that turned from bruising, teeth-gnashingly painful to lips molding together in softer, chaste touches and fingers massaging the skin they touched. Embarrassing moans, and the fiery licks Shizuo pressed to his sensitized lips before the careful, almost tentative embrace of tongues meeting and winding together in a breathless kiss. He had been reluctant to close his eyes even though Shizuo's were, and it was the moment, he remembered, when his eyelids closed over his eyes that he relaxed and felt Shizuo holding him, like he was supposed to be there. Everything had been so foreign, so strange but awkwardly addicting with the taste of older tobacco and a hint of sugar—pastry related, he would have bet—and the heavy saliva that made him shudder when it mingled with his. In all, it was horribly imperfect with all the intense stimulation from just touches alone, yet it made him want _more._

Although they've never gone past kissing—partially, if not mostly due to Izaya's obvious uncomfortable feelings or more like blank analyzing of a sexual relationship—there were times he wondered what sex would be like with Shizuo. He didn't usually get far, though, due to the fact that he would have to be giving up every single thing he knew to keep himself shielded. And it was more than intimidating; the act of baring oneself to another for a relationship that he would normally ignore in favor of keeping himself isolated from humanity. Shizuo never knew how much it bothered him, however, and Izaya never answered when the other asked. Interestingly enough, Shizuo didn't press him. Izaya tried to understand, knowing how much Shizuo wanted it, but restrained himself and gave yet another example that he wasn't completely a beast.

Fast forward six months later. Careful relationship painfully awkward in its first stages becoming more of a dragging routine the further apart they were. L-word turning back to angry hatred that stirred up more fights in the past month they've ever had in a month before they were together. Emotions were always a tricky game to play with and probably one of Izaya's strongest weaknesses (possibly his Achilles Heel) and logic had failed him every time. The only defense he had, his only trump card turned over in a useless hand to a game with unclear rules. But to Shizuo, it probably was all just a game anyway. The insults of _unfeeling bastard _and _cold-blooded parasite _were oddly befitting of Izaya. And the interesting thing was that he already knew that.

It was mainly his fault. Shizuo had tried to get him to open up, to try the strange new thing they both wanted but didn't admit to. He was patient and considerably kinder, even with his temper he tried to keep in check most of the time (Izaya was surprised by his self-control) and the touches they exchanged were reassuring that he was doing something right. Every day was a new challenge, but Izaya, being the stubborn parasite he happened to be, dug his feet into the ground and couldn't figure out how to trust so easily as his Shizu-chan did. And in the beginning, he was okay with that. Until now, that is, and Shizuo's not his. Never probably was. His poor self-control faltered with Izaya's unintentional cruel remarks and insults when he meant something else—his defense system that he could use because of how frustratingly uncomfortable he was—and Shizuo had gotten fed up. Not like he could blame him, anyway. Most of the time he did just because he was too proud to admit fault. He didn't want to be (making mistakes) human.

Hands tightened around his throat. Shizuo was saying something with his lips moving ever so slowly and Izaya's brain chose now to fail him. He saw the eyes he'd seen every day for six months in different forms of complex emotions ranging from lov—softness to the moments where he'd be swept up in a mockingly serious rage, but this look was an older one and part of him wondered why he didn't miss it. Shizuo looked so angry, so upset and confused all at the same time which confused Izaya in the question of how many emotions could Shizuo show at once, exactly. There were other ones, not entirely definable by his knowledge of complex emotions which he had prided himself in by studying others. Shizuo confused him and angered him to no end because he _couldn't read him at all. _

A pitiful sound broke the rush of blood in his ears, more like a groan and a whimper that he didn't realize where it came from until Shizuo's hands were off of him and he was saying things Izaya didn't understand, but his face contorted into something unreadable, again. Then Shizuo's voice rose louder and louder until it pierced Izaya's ears, and when the garbled words didn't compute, Shizuo only grew angrier. Izaya thought he felt a pang in his chest, but it was just as hollow as the rest of him felt.

"Get up!" It rung in his ears loudly like a bell toll and suddenly he was on his feet against the wall and Shizuo was holding him by the collar of his T-shirt like a cat. "You're so damn annoying, flea. Get _out._" So Shizuo probably thought Izaya was ignoring him, going by how angry he was and how tight his grip was. Painstakingly Izaya fought the silence that caught in his throat and tried not to allow himself to slip out of the confines of his control and get over what was causing him to pause and lose control of his physical functions. Was he poisoned? No, Shizuo wouldn't do that, and it wasn't like he had the resources either.

Numb with silence Izaya let himself be thrown against the destroyed apartment door with a bone-cracking thud and couldn't get the adrenaline in his brain to act quickly enough when Shizuo stomped over and he could barely hold himself up. It seemed so out of character for him to be completely incapacitated, something that didn't compute well with him and therefore it was more than just frustrating at this point that he couldn't regain himself quickly enough. Something must have affected him enough. Emotions? Logically, there was nothing physically wrong with him, save for the possibilities of broken bones but why couldn't he move or talk or think as Shizuo tossed him around like a ragdoll, just like the old days where there was nothing between them.

Finally his senses cleared the moments Shizuo was several feet away from him, snarling angrily and ready to attack him again and an uncomfortable feeling of icy thickness dug itself into his chest, constricting his throat further than the bruising grip Shizuo provided earlier. Nausea rolled in his stomach and his skin felt like it was on fire when Shizuo grabbed him (forgetting to dodge) and gripped him tightly with his fingers encircling his arms.

"You're a bastard and you know it. I can't believe you, but it's not harder to believe than you actually being serious with me." Shizuo growled, and this time Izaya found his voice in the hazy revival of his brain.

"I never lied to you, Shizu-chan. I told you the truth that you asked for, and yet you get the same notion that I'm the bad one here." Izaya choked out.

"Now you finally speak? What took you so long, waiting for a moment to catch me off guard?" Izaya struggled in his grasp before managing to forcefully wrench himself away, pushing Shizuo back and grabbing his switchblade from his jacket and flicking it open.

"Don't touch me, Shizu-chan." Izaya warned when Shizuo stepped closer, glaring to emphasize his point. "I've had enough of your ridiculous rambling. The thought of it makes me ill with how simplistic you really are. Too bad you can't actually have the capability of going beyond using your anger to control others. Did you really think that would work on me, Shizu-chan?" The blade swished in a warning slice inches away from Shizuo as words tumbled out of his mouth on their own accord, laced with an unusually high concentration of anger. He knew he was getting out of control at this point, and needed to leave now. There was no point in trying anymore, not when Shizuo didn't even notice. He was wrong about him before, then. It seemed Shizuo couldn't be as perceptive as Izaya had thought.

"I hate you." Izaya sneered. "I hate you more than anything on this planet. I could never tolerate a monster like you." His words did the trick as Shizuo's anger pulsed through him and then fists were swinging and Izaya was stepping out of the way. There was the nagging feeling in Izaya's head that what they were doing wasn't right but he ignored it in favor of covering his emotional failure with just making Shizuo out to be more out-of-control than he was. And that was easier to do than to stop now.

"Get out! I never want to see your fucking face again!" This was it: the end. Izaya knew it was coming. Not when, but he knew it would happen. And there was nothing he knew how to do to fix it, or even if he wanted to. This was for the best. This relationship in itself was a logical fallacy waiting to fall apart having a foundation of nothing but crumbled, disjointed half-truths and one-sided affection. He knew, he knew he knew—and it changed nothing. The emotions swelled in his throat and choked him with surprising aggression and threatened to bubble over, but he couldn't let Shizuo see him like this. This wasn't the Izaya he was supposed to be. Shizuo wouldn't care besides mocking him with the excuse that Izaya was only trying to lie to him more.

Shizuo brought his hand to the doorknob and swung it open, shoving Izaya outside with a particularly rough shove that sent the smaller informant tumbling down the steps and eventually crashing to the side of the street. Random objects began flying at the fallen informant at alarming speed and when he got to his feet he took off in a sprint, forgetting his destroyed laptop at Shizuo's apartment in favor of not being crushing by a sudden vending machine falling from the sky and nearly crushing him in his compromised sprint with a slight limp in his leg.

He never looked back to make sure Shizuo wasn't chasing him. In all honesty, the last thing he wanted was to have to face Shizuo again in any way, shape, or form. Their argument meant the end of what he knew for many months. Which meant he would have to forget in order to not agonize over the details he failed to understand leading up to this point in which his chest heaved as he struggled for breath but kept running. Other than wanting nothing more to just get to his apartment and collapse on his bed to stop the choking breaths catching in his throat, the emotions which rode up in tidal waves—crashing into him at unexpected intervals he kept down by forcing himself not to think about it. Soon the inexplicable urges of emotional charge quieted down and the hollow feeling pervaded throughout him, keeping the task at hand as his only thought and forgetting all the rest of conflicting strings of thought from his mind. He didn't even have the strength to laugh at the absurdity of it all, which was what he normally would have done before moving right along.

What did Shizuo do to him all those weeks? There wasn't something specific he could pinpoint. But maybe it was just the monster's attempt to be human, which Izaya knew would never work because monsters could not be humans no matter how hard they tried. No, stop thinking about it.

No thoughts of Shizuo. No fights, no memories, no unsettling emotional reactions. Just emptiness where deletion began and would trek across his memory so he'd forget it all and just consider this an incident caused by a lack of proper judgment. Empty, hollow, and numb. File it away, pretend it never happened. It was a stupid idea in the first place.

This was for the best, after all.

Shizuo stared at the broken milk bottle littering on and scratching the dining table. When he'd come back from blowing off steam (and destroying several traffic signs, a parked car, and several windows) he took in the damage from his own destruction, sitting innocently in the table where he used to eat with Izaya. Not the flea, but Izaya.

Then he picked up the broken shards, ignoring how they sliced his skin with ease as he swept them into a garbage can. A wet rag attended to the milk stains and when he finished he looked up and over to the desk out of habit, finding Izaya's dented laptop that was still somehow on.

His heart ached. He'd been betrayed the first time he'd placed his trust in someone—who didn't even care about him from the beginning—which hurt a lot more than he thought it could. Muted anger still coursed thickly through his arteries but the dominant emotion overwhelming him was guilt. It surprised him, considering that he'd just been in a fake relationship where he actually had feelings toward another and they were not returned. However he could not get Izaya's face out of his head, after he'd fallen to the floor and he seemed so out of it. Right then he was worried that Izaya had a serious concussion and it almost felt compulsory to do something to help him, but he summed it up as the flea playing with him even more, which fueled his rampage further. Before he knew it he'd been grasping Izaya's neck (the same one he kissed) and crushing it underneath the fingers that had once touched the same skin fondly. What a strange contrast, indeed.

The rage he felt was insatiable. He felt the urge to kill Izaya right then and there when that moron had the audacity to speak to him after remaining in silence for so long. Against his better judgment he had injured him even more but was able to kick him out instead of doing something he knew he would regret.

Suffering in silence to his self-depreciating thoughts, Shizuo decided to test the laptop, as angry as he was with the flea, and opened the lid. There was a password and he was instantly denied to Izaya's private life. Fine, then. It wasn't like he needed to know about the flea's job, anyway. And closing the lid without the same slamming force as earlier, Shizuo roughly collapsed into the chair with limbs folding in as he came to realize what he had just done.

Izaya was never able to express himself clearly. Shizuo had a hard time of trying to figure out what he was trying to say through every insult he endured and silent answers to any inquiry of his. It wasn't like he was easy to read either, with a blank expression usually of sadistic amusement or a carefully constructed expression that left Shizuo unable to find anything on what he was thinking or feeling. And at first, he was patient. He kept coaxing Izaya to give a little more as time passed, but nothing came out of his efforts. It actually seemed like Izaya was receding through it all, which only fueled Shizuo's anger.

There were many reasons Shizuo snapped tonight. Tried to cool off before coming back to Izaya who told him he'd be there, and tried to reason with himself that he shouldn't be angry. Izaya's insults were not supposed to affect him and make him hate the flea more. Although more and more he began to think that Izaya was a flea by how unemotional he was and the complete lack of trying in what little they had. It wasn't asking for much, so how much did Izaya want before he would try to show some emotions other than hate?

He swallowed thickly. Didn't want to remember the way Izaya's face contorted when the mask crumbled under his fist and his brain kept reminding him, translating the expression of falsely hardened features to mask any kind of dejected feeling that may or may not have been present. Somehow he knew better. And that truth was harder to swallow than cover it with a pleasant lie that Izaya never felt anything. He knew it wasn't true.

It shook him with the boneless feeling slowly creeping up and under his flesh. Not anger this time clouded his thoughts when he tried to ignore the pained expression he undeniably saw right before he ended everything between them. Justified by only strands of broken thoughts that really didn't make much sense (he was so stubborn) he gave into the sick sensation churning his stomach that registered guilt and immediately chastised everything he was for being just what Izaya said: a monster.

_You could see right through him, if you tried. _His brain reminded him in a breathless murmur. Voices shaking as they rose from distilled mutters of every barb and jab Izaya'd ever said to him resounded in his head. Then with the increasing volume as the increase of chaos he heard his own insults digging into his skull like the blade of a knife, breaking the flesh open to expose his own guilty fault in the entirety of it all. He groaned pitifully—not like Izaya did—and ran a hand through his hair.

Izaya never hid anything from him. At least, that's what he said (and Shizuo refused to believe _anything _anymore) right after he'd been slammed into a door and trembling for some unclarified reason under his fingers. He wanted to believe it was just for show, something to hold over Shizuo's head so that they would come to this.

Then _why _did Izaya let that mask fall right after Shizuo said he hated him? Why repeat the same ugly words back—well, why wouldn't he, monster—and then freeze like he had suddenly lost control of himself, and let Shizuo hit him? That glimmer in bloody red when he muttered those words—_get away from me—_only served to worsen Shizuo's (misplaced) reluctant anger. That point had him growling angrily; how dare he act like Shizuo was—

Wrong. Utterly, stupidly, whatever expressed just how much he'd _fucked up. _Big time, considering he just threw Izaya out onto the street and chased him down until he noticed Izaya limp and he stopped himself. It was like a draining effect where the adrenaline surging through him suddenly left him and here he was, panting on a street corner with a dented stop sign in his grasp that crunched under his enormous strength, and the way Izaya never looked back at him like he would in their regular chases haunted him.

Guilty as charged, then. He'd accepted that when he opened his eyes and the reality began to sink in a little more. Almost like he was drunk he pushed himself up, stumbling to his bedroom and ignoring the carton of cigarettes he just bought in lieu of the fights _he _brought on. _He _caused. But neither of them would admit to being wrong, right?

The bedroom was a mess. A human-shaped indent in his bed triggering a memory of Izaya falling asleep in the same spot when Shizuo had gone out for sushi. A box of fatty tuna in hand and some generic menu item he didn't much care for left on the table he had come in, not expecting the sight of a vulnerable Izaya lying on his bed, curled up underneath the covers and sleeping as if he wasn't in his former enemy—lover's bed. Shizuo had decided then, he recalled bitterly, that the sushi could wait as this was a chance he'd only get once a day, so why not take advantage?

The ghost of Izaya's skin under his arms, wrapped in them and the rise and fall of his chest pressing against Shizuo's back came with a sudden ferocity that had Shizuo's head reeling. Ghostly lips pressed to the carotid artery and hot breath trickling down his arm. Finally, he'd fall asleep right then and there—one kiss pressing to the corner of Izaya's lips that didn't make him stir—and he'd let himself mold against the other like it was a natural thing. It always felt like it was.

He pretended he didn't feel the shift of weight that made the blankets quiver with sudden movement. Didn't remember the way a pair of lips brushed against his shyly. And the curious stare of sleep-heavy eyes watching for any recognition at all before dipping his head down and curling into Shizuo, cautiously. But so tightly that it hurt to breathe without him.

_You did this. _He was aware of that. Aware of the fact he didn't want to remember anything he'd just done. How stupid he was for being so blind to the signs and the subtle shifts in Izaya's body language or tone of voice that his brain dutifully alerted him to. Ignored them in favor of trying to not fuck up anything.

And by trying not to fuck up, he fucked up everything.

_What have I done?_

* * *

><p><em>The series goes as listed: Breaking Point, Abreaction, Mend.<br>_

_Thank you for reading._


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